Othello is
a Shakespearean tragedy: when the hero makes a terrible mistake of
judgment, his once promising world is led into ruin. Computer analysis
of the play’s text, however, suggests that the play is a comedy or, at
least, that it does the same things with words that comedies usually do.

Are
we now at the point where computers and humans really "see” the same
thing in literary texts? Hear Folger Director Michael Witmore talk about
what it’s like to "data-mine” Shakespeare’s plays, a process that
ultimately demonstrates the complexity and power of human judgments
about literary texts.